Head New Media

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Head New Media was an influential[1] web design and interactive television agency set up in the UK in 1997. In 1998 it became[2] the UK digital arm of the world's fourth largest advertising group Lowe Worldwide, part of Interpublic. The agency was at one point the most awarded in Europe[3] and produced an 'in-house' website Head-Space which won awards including Cannes, and spawned online communities including Urban75. In 1998 the UK's first specialist interactive television creative agency Head End was set up as a wholly-owned subsidiary (later acquired by Underwired[4]).

Head New Media's clients included the BBC, Sci-Fi Channel, Unilever (for which the agency produced interactive television advertising on cable operator NTL), Tesco (one of the first interactive TV ads[5] on Flextech[6]), General Motors, Mars Confectionery's Snickers (whose website Snickers MegaBite[7] won a variety of major global advertising awards between 1997-8) and PricewaterhouseCoopers. Its original founders were Felix Velarde and Jason Holland, previously of HyperInteractive (1994-1997) and, following Head New Media's liquidation[8] in 2001, Underwired[9].

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Annual Listing of Top Design Shops" from IPPA
  2. ^ "Campaign Report on New Media" from Management Today
  3. ^ "IMG SRC100" from SHIFT(JAPAN), 1998
  4. ^ "Underwired acquires Head End Interactive Television" from Creative Match, December 2002
  5. ^ "Digital, Interactive and Web TV" from Managing Change, 2000
  6. ^ "iTV Developers & Agencies" from BroadbandBananas
  7. ^ "Snickers MegaBite" Archive of website
  8. ^ "Feature: Head closes after ad partnership crumbles" from E-consultancy, 2001
  9. ^ Underwired's website